


Supposed to be hopeful (or, comment-fic & untitled)

by glovered



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Purgatory, robo!sam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-05
Updated: 2011-03-05
Packaged: 2017-10-24 09:17:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/261679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glovered/pseuds/glovered
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Crowley comes to check in on S & D re: location of Purgatory</p>
            </blockquote>





	Supposed to be hopeful (or, comment-fic & untitled)

**Author's Note:**

> written back in November, when I thought show was telling us that earth is Purgatory.

The soul, a secret, fluttering thing. Dean imagines it to be the size and consistency of a kleenex. Sam talks about getting it back like it's a supersoaker he can trade for once he gets some arcade tickets.

Crowley shows up just when Dean's getting real creeped out, a few weeks past that small pact at a picnic bench. Dean's gotten wise to the way Sam ticks since then, how his mouth shapes funny around his familiar idioms and how his reaction time is two seconds behind what it used to be. His laugh's got a mean edge to it, too, and he'll always do what Dean suggests now, which is both unsettling and useful.

Sam's watching Dean even now, lips pursed, eyes squinting at him like he‘s calculating. Dean tries to ignore him to focus on the short guy in front of him and ranger station visible just across the road.

"He's like a freaking robot," he complains.

"Sorry, no warranty. And I'd call his problem more anti-social than robotic," Crowley says. Sam drags his eyes from Dean to smolder briefly in that direction. "He's still human, I assure you, soul or no, even if that does make him a bit...empty."

“Right here,” Sam says, although he just stands rigid against the car, like it's irrelevant if it's true. His eyes are glittering due to the light, nothing more. Dean swears the kid watches him sleep.

"Look, I don't want to get into any deep philosophical discussion right now," Dean says. "Just cut to the chase. What do you want?"

"I'm here to...check in," Crowley tells them, which means exactly jack squat.

"I've kind of got my hands full," Dean says. "Oregon forest service has record of some animal attacks in the area that fit skinwalker MO. I'm gonna talk to the rangers, find you your Alpha and then get Terminator here his soul back? That enough of an update for you?"

“Just about. Had any thoughts yourself on the location of Purgatory, while you‘re at it?”

“Look, I‘m not here to get you your next rank of available souls, or whatever it is you think you‘re going to find there.”

"Oh do your homework boys," Crowley says. "Purgatory is where souls go to be burnished, examined for blemishes. Their love is judged and, if found unsalvagable, they're taken below. I could spend my time coaxing souls from Purgatory, but as most will come down my way soon enough, why bother?"

"Thanks for the Wikipedia summary," Dean says, and Sam doesn't even bat an eye at that, Dean could weep. Old Sam would have sighed and lain a gentle hand over his laptop bag, repentant in his brother's stead. "We're not concerned with Purgatory; that's your gig, not ours. I don't care about your hotel chain or whatever else you're planning to build, I just want my brother, you son of a bitch."

"Yes, yes, how very righteous of you, Dean."

“You can go righteous my ass for all I care.”

Dean mentally counts to two and then Sam snorts a laugh.

"You find that funny, Sam?" Crowley asks.

"No," Sam answers truthfully.

Dean sneers at them both.

Crowley shrugs. "Well, made me smile."

Then he's gone, and all that remains is the heady scent of pine trees, puff clouds and a gravel road, and it’s like one more half-formed moment of relief. Nothing like the king of Hell to make him thankful for some alone time with a shoddy excuse for a sibling.

"Dean," Sam says. "Let's go catch an Alpha."

"Something about this just doesn't add up," Dean mutters. "Hey, you think Crowley's trying to use us?"

"I thought that was pretty overt."

"No, like why does he want me? Out of all the other hunters? Way I figure, he either needs me to reign you in, else he has some other plan."

"Does it matter? He's the only one who can pull my-" Sam's "-soul out of the cage. That’s what matters. It's down there, and he can pull it out."

"Give it up, all that ninth circle of hell crap," Dean tells him.

"Why can't the Cage be literal?" Sam asks. "Everything has been until now."

Gotta give it to him, because maybe he's right. Dean'd sat across a checkered table from Death himself. If that wasn't literal, what was? He and Sam had found their metaphorical road through Heaven as a matchbox car ramp in a closet of their old house, and the linchpin of the apocalypse had been just three brothers in a field on a sunny day.

"Huh," he says.

"Hell's definitely a place, Dean," Sam says, more pedantic than earnest. "Levels and all. You were in a describable place, even if it was just your soul."

Dean idly resists the urge to punch Sam in the head - _just your soul_ \- while he examines this idea.

"According to the 14th century text, the soul is escorted by an angel to the mountain of purgatory," Sam is saying.

“Dante? That‘s fiction, Sam.”

"We should call Cas,” Sam says. “Maybe he knows something. Maybe he can 'escort' us."

"Already been escorted, thanks," Dean says. He touches a finger to his shoulder.

“And here you are,” Sam says.

“Here I am,” Dean agrees. “It's almost like, like Crowley knows where Purgatory exists, somehow. He's just looking for-"

"An in, yeah." And now Sam has pulled out a gun and is running a finger along its cool length. He’s all focused on Dean, on what they’re saying, but he’s lacking that whole other level of awareness, the one where he seems like a psycho right now and doesn‘t notice.

"Put the safety back on," Dean says. Recent events've got him jumping out of his skin at every damn thing.

"I told you," Sam tells him. "I won't kill you. I need you. Now let's go catch an Alpha."

He stalks off towards the station, finished with this conjecture and aiming to make some quantifiable headway. Dean examines the whole height of him. He's always had trouble learning to see Sam from any different angle, but now the difference is stark.

It’s all a puzzle, because Sam needs him and then Crowley needs him, and he can‘t figure why on either count. Crowley needs him to need Sam, maybe. And Purgatory is that place where you‘re stuck until you‘re not, the place where your soul is tested and put on the scales. From there, it's Heaven or Hell.

Dean takes a long look around him with a dark suspicion, at the spiky forest and at the heavens spread wide overhead.

Purgatory. Forest for the trees.


End file.
